The Pimple That Changed My Life: A Case for Going Makeup Free

"Today it's just my face."

Once upon a time, when I was around 21, the biggest, juiciest, most disgusting zit took up residence on my left cheek. This thing was so monumental people still mention it (as though it was a disastrous summer fling or a sex experiment gone wrong). Despite pleas from friends, my mother, and my boyfriend, I refused to cover it up. I doubly refused to hack away at it. Instead, I tended to it like Mr. Miyagi would his bonsai—with a master's discipline. I kept my face clean. I alternated between Mario Badescu Drying Lotion and hydrocortisone. I dabbed it with tea tree oil. I sang it soothing lullabies. It took 14 days to die.

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One pimple caused more disruption in two weeks than the entire year I spent drinking exclusively through a crazy straw (because I was a very strange and very stubborn 14-year-old) and my refusal to cover-up the little bastard caused a real to-do. And so going make-up free began as an act of defiance.

My first boss, the editor of a fashion magazine, gave me bronzer and told me to use it "liberally". My co-workers were delighted with the results. So much so that on the days I didn't wear the magical fairy dust I caused mass disappointment akin to an entire first grade class discovering simultaneously that Santa isn't real. Make-up Free Days became my way of giving the world the middle finger. It's my way of saying, "I don't care if you think I'm pretty or not today." As the years passed my weekly MFDs became important for an entirely different reason.

As I write this at my desk I am not wearing makeup. Not a lick. Today, it's just my face.

People don't always understand why I intentionally skip make-up. A few months back as I was recovering from a cold, a coworker suggested postponing my MFD until I felt (and presumably looked) "better." Another once asked if I felt less attractive sans cosmetics because I didn't receive compliments with a bare face. She was right, and not at all trying to be hurtful. On MFDs I seem to disappear; I don't receive compliments and I don't get hit on.

So why do it?

Because I believe my face has qualities that are far more important than attractiveness.

I select my MFDs at random—independent of the company-wide presentations or the ritzy dinners—because I believe that my charisma, charm, and chutzpah come from me, not my bold lip or my impeccable cat-eye (which we all know is a fool's errand because no one can create symmetrically winged eyes—not even Beyoncé). Yes, I really have given presentations in front of over 200 people with a completely bare face. For me, the whole notion of embracing my so-called natural beauty is a sham. I prefer to think of it as just embracing ME—beauty or not—instead of bowing to an obligation to always appear at my most attractive.

Last week, Leandra Medine of The Man Repeller wrote a moving response to the Internet's disgust at her makeup-lessness (eff you Oxford Dictionary, that is definitely a word). And though her words left me brimming with admiration, I remain heartbroken that people still criticize so harshly what a woman does—or doesn't do—to her face. The judgement of her attractiveness is as relevant to her talent as a peanut allergy.

Whether you like to roll makeup free or not is none of my business. This pact I made over a decade ago was my way of resizing the importance of my attractiveness. And it worked for me. Of course I still enjoy the rush of turning heads when I walk into a bar all dolled up, but no more than I enjoy making a table of co-workers laugh—even with a throbbing zit on my chin.